Artisan Partners, an investment management company, released its “Artisan Mid Cap Fund” first quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In the first quarter, the fund’s Investor Class fund ARTMX returned -7.40%, Advisor Class fund APDMX posted a return of -7.37%, and Institutional Class fund APHMX returned -7.35%, compared to a -7.12% return for the Russell Midcap Growth Index. US equities achieved solid Q4 gains, concluding a strong year. After a period of strong growth stock performance in 2023 and 2024, value stocks gained the lead in Q1 2025. In a risk-averse environment, investors shifted towards lower-volatility equities, especially in the utilities and consumer staples sectors, alongside those with higher dividend yields. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2025.
In its first-quarter 2025 investor letter, Artisan Mid Cap Fund highlighted stocks such as Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT). Headquartered in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) offers audio streaming subscription services. The one-month return of Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) was 23.02%, and its shares gained 113.94% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On May 5, 2025, Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) stock closed at $637.65 per share with a market capitalization of $130.754 billion.
Artisan Mid Cap Fund stated the following regarding Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) in its Q1 2025 investor letter:
“Among our top Q1 contributors were Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT), Ascendis and AutoZone. Spotify share momentum continued in 2025, following another set of strong earnings results, including 12% growth in monthly active users and 16% revenue growth. Importantly, the company’s profit margin has been expanding nicely, and we believe it can continue to rise due to likely price increases, potentially better terms with labels and further cost discipline. We trimmed the position due to our valuation discipline but continue to believe in the company’s long-term prospects.”
A person wearing headphones listening to an audio streaming service.
Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) is in 25th position on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 101 hedge fund portfolios held Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) at the end of the fourth quarter compared to 98 in the third quarter. In Q1, Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) generated a total revenue of $4.2 billion, reflecting a year-over-year growth of 15% on a constant currency basis. While we acknowledge the potential of Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is as promising as NVIDIA but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
In another article, we covered Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE:SPOT) and shared the list of best performing large cap stocks so far in 2025. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q1 2025 page for more investor letters from hedge funds and other leading investors.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.